Pages

18/06/2011

Rebecca Black's 'Friday' Removed By YouTube

She has amassed nearly as many "dislikes" as she has YouTube viewers since unleashing her debut song Friday earlier this year, but now Rebecca Black's detested single has been removed from the international video site owing to a dispute with her record label.

Ark Music Factory, the company behind the teenager's single, has given few details about what the dispute involves, but TMZ quotes a spokesperson for the singer as saying:

"We can confirm that we submitted a Take Down Notice to YouTube as a result of the dispute we have with Ark Music regarding the 'Friday' video."

The issue is thought to involve Ark's sudden decision to make Friday a "rental" video, in which users pay $2.99 (£1.85) to watch Black parading around in a convertible and generally looking forward to the weekend. This is thought to have caused disagreement between Ark and Black's representatives over who owns the rights to Black's image. Black's mother originally paid Ark to write and produce the song and its accompanying video for her daughter.

Friday was released in March and became a viral hit either because of or despite its vacuous lyrics. Its chorus repeats the words Friday, and its verses list the many things Black does on that day: eat cereal, go to school, say Friday over and over again in anticipation of an amazing weekend. However, despite achieving 167m YouTube views, Black was also the subject of sustained internet abuse.

For those who have not yet watched the video for Friday, the song still appears in some forms on YouTube, including an acoustic performance.

[Grim] I'm with the guy in the cap that makes himself scarce as soon as the 'singing' begins ... [/Grim]